New! Climate Change

In this section, you may find new materials that have been published on ‘Climate Change’ since the date of the event. We continually select major new publications and articles that add up to the policy points discussed in the briefing.

This policy brief explores the level of ambition between the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the negotiations for climate change. It aims to provide decision makers with a better understanding, and provide recommendations where possible, of the implications of possible outcomes for the achievement of the SDGs. The brief aims to encourage governments and funders ensure that SDGs and associated financing deliver on climate compatible development goals in the poorest and most climate vulnerable countries.

The Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC) has contributed to a scientific paper published by the Oceans 2015 Initiative in the influential Science magazine and launched on the eve of the “Our common future under climate change” scientific conference in Paris. The paper evaluates and compares the risks of impacts on marine and coastal ecosystems and the services they provide under two potential carbon dioxide (CO2) emission pathways over this century. The paper reminds that the global ocean: absorbed 93% of the earth’s additional heat since the 1970s, keeping the atmosphere cooler but increasing ocean temperature; captured 28% of human-caused CO2 emissions since 1750, but acidifying the ocean; and collected virtually all water from melting ice, furthering sea-level rise. Impacts from anthropogenic CO2 emissions on key marine and coastal organisms, ecosystems and services are already detectable across all latitudes.

Climate change is forcing the nine-member Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) to choose between expending scarce resources to deal with its impact or other pressing development goals. “There is a very thin line between consumption and conservation…progress and protection,” Grenada’s Environment Minister Roland Bhola told IPS. He explained that countries still have to fulfil the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which include reducing poverty and hunger, while dealing with the impacts of climate change. But there is a flicker of hope for these countries. The European Union (EU) has signed a financial agreement for 39.5 million East Caribbean dollars for a project designed to improve the sub-region’s natural resource base and its resilience to impacts of climate change.

The Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP) convened the annual review meeting of the Pacific Adaptation to Climate Change (PACC) project, which provided participants the opportunity to showcase country activities as the project moves into its fourth year, focusing on replication and scaling-up of activities.

The Caribbean Climate Online Risk and Adaptation Tool (CCORAL) was launched here Friday twith regional countries hoping it will become another initiative that will result in meaningful progress in the battle to combat climate change.
The new initiative will promote climate smart development by helping to embed a risk management ethic in decision-making processes and is a seminal on-line support tool in keeping with the thrust to promote a culture of risk management across the region.
The CCORAL has been developed by the Belize-based Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre (CCCCC), with funding from the United Kingdom Department for International Development (DFID) and the Climate Development and Knowledge Network (CDKN).

The first of three books in IFPRI’s climate change in Africa series, West African Agriculture and Climate Change: A Comprehensive Analysis examines the food security threats facing 11 of the countries that make up West Africa — Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Guinea, Liberia, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, and Togo — and explores how climate change will increase the efforts needed to achieve sustainable food security throughout the region. [Click here to read the paper]

As a set of countries with development as their overriding priority and yet highly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change, the Least Developed Countries are in a unique position to help broker an agreement that is informed by science and meets basic needs.
This policy brief puts forward three ideas that could make such an agreement possible: focusing on clean energy services; tying mitigation commitments with development outcomes; and innovating by building coalitions of state and non-state actors to incorporate the momentum and learning happening outside of the immediate treaty process. [Click here to read the paper]

Climate change is likely to have adverse effects on the agriculture sector in Jamaica. Increase in the intensity and frequency of climate related natural hazards, increasing rainfall variability, droughts and floods combined with fragile ecosystems and coastal zones all contribute to Jamaica?s overall vulnerability to climate change. Climate change adaptation is one of the outcomes of the Vision 2030 Jamaica-National Development Plan. In the context of this plan, there is need for more analysis of the likely climate change impacts in the short and medium term, along with identification of agricultural adaptation strategies. This report provides detailed information about current knowledge on vulnerability, past trends in climate, and impacts of climate variability and change on agriculture sector. The scope of the study focused on broader policy directions, technical alternatives and investment priorities in relation to climate change adaptation. The report also provides examples of good practices of coping strategies in agriculture and a detailed list of ongoing and completed projects/initiatives related to climate change and agriculture in Jamaica. [Click here to read the report]

Downloads

The website of the Brussels Briefings allows you to download presentations and reports from a wide array of development subjects. For almost all Briefings, you can watch the entire video documentation of the Briefing online. Click on the name of the Briefing to access videos, presentations and reports.